Artifacts
by ofmoments
Summary: Episode Spellbound remixed. In which Raven is scarier than ever, Beast Boy is more clueless than usual, and no one gets happily ever after but they're trying.
1. Chapter 1: Two rocky starts

Disclaimer: Teen Titans belongs to Warner Brothers, until it doesn't anymore.

A/N: I wish there was a layman's guide to how the comics actually work.

* * *

Raven hadn't thought she would pass the interview, which mainly consisted of her repeating "I don't feel comfortable disclosing that information" and Robin shaking his thoroughly slicked head of hair.

"Before we start, I want to assure you that this is just a formality the League insisted on," he said gravelly.

"I hate conversations that begin with that sentence," she said, and he wrote something in his notepad which might have been _wisecracker_ while in his own stack of notes Beast Boy – how did he become co-interviewer instead of someone sensible like- never mind – wrote something suspiciously like _angry porcupine_.

Just as well, she managed to negotiate a few terms into her contract, including designated personal space and freedom of speech: who are allowed to talk back to me.

"How did you do?" Starfire bounced after they finished in what she might have believed to be a greeting, and what Raven usually called an ambush, "do you think three superpowers are enough? Does flying count? I thought there would be a question about background but there weren't a whole lot."

"How dare you!" came Cyborg's enraged voice from behind the door, "Of course I am waterproof!"

"I think the interview is customized," Raven said, "the League's been doing this for years."

What she is getting to, of course, is that every time she looks at Starfire, every time the manic pixie dream girl opens her mouth or orchestrates a campaign or whatever, she shudders and thinks, thank God I'm not that person. She doesn't fill in awkward silences with shop talk or, God forbids, weather talk, utterly unnecessary and obvious. She revels in silence. That's her thing.

When Beast Boy and Cyborg turn the conversation into Nintendo gadgets and Robin adds a few asides about combos though, even Starfire can expound on the practicality of the moves while Raven withdraws, automatically, seamlessly, almost haughtily now. She tells herself, this isn't the conversation I want to have, and bats away the follow-up, what kind of conversations _can_ I have?

Not for lack of effort. They tried, she tried, but it ain't happening.

Now, whenever Beast Boy shows up with something unspeakable on his arm, she redirects him to clause five of her contract. It's just that she has been interrupted for the umpteen time reading this new book, so her answers have been more clipped than usual.

She tries a new approach, "No," she says very slowly, and repeats after a confused silence ensues, "No."

"What are you doing," he asks, "that's kinda creepy, by the way."

She shuts the door in his face, mildly unsatisfying with a sliding door, but what do you do with a persistent brain-addled sidekick?

_I agree_, says a deep voice, _idiots like that should be put down for their own good_.

"Father," she picks up the book, "can it be my birthday present?"

_Actually, it's me_, temporizes the book. She drops it and maybe takes a little step backward.


	2. Chapter 2: First Blush

A/N: It's a remix, okay? So I am tossing out some dialogues. Also, spoilers for everything just to be safe.

* * *

This isn't the first time Raven crushes on a book.

How does anyone calling herself a witch not fall head over heels for that book? The story is an epic with insights into the arts, handwritten in accurate and fluent Azarath ruins, and competently illustrated for 11th century art. It isn't even the first edition thing book that collectors worship. Kevin Knighting told her that the book was one of a kind, not that she believes seedy back alley dealers whom she let off for a discount on tomes, but it only makes her fall more readily for the goddamned moth fest. Which is the saddest thing of course, the book is already coming apart at the seams and the pages look a few years shy of crumbling away. But the last book she loved was The Great Magical Mysteries Of The 12th Century, private compilation, that she had had to commission a crystal dome and remove dust particle by particle for, so Raven supposes she has a type.

The first time the alarm blared red and Beast Boy's obnoxious voice filtered through when she was reading, she contemplated bringing the book for the drive, but freaked out at what could happen to it. Terra had trashed the T-car like a hulk of metal, and it had gone for more swims than the average super vehicle. She could just conceal the book in her cape, but what if monster of the week spurted slime (15% chance)? So she left off where Malchior's waist was wrapped in the Dragon's enormous claws, gasping for breath to read the spell, the dragon's fire ghosting over his neck and illuminating the amber in his eyes.

It _is_ a little too descriptive and possibly obsessed with the dragon's big, strong grips and Malchior's sharp figure, but like she said, perfect for a witch.

Now the book speaks.

"Did you-" she says,

"Speak?"

"Uh-huh,"

"I did," the deep, playful voice runs through her like a current and she feels something inside seize frantically, "And then you dropped me on my spine."

The _sorry!_ is reflexive.

'How do you know my name?', she wants to ask, but answers the question herself, 'Magic'. 'How are you speaking?', 'Magic'.

"Who are you?" she asks instead.

"I am Malchior of Nol, at your service" it, no, he says, the book turns to page half ripped out, one with his piercing eyes she knows are silver and god, was she hit harder on the head than she thought.

"I defeated the dragon Rorek and was trapped inside these pages by its final curse," he continues.

"But that was-"

"Almost one thousand years ago, and I've been waiting for someone to find me ever since.

"Raven, I've been waiting for you."

The pages turn again to another illustration, hers, seeming to be kicking ass and taking names. Of course, her birth had been prophesized for much longer than a millennium by every magic book ever. It's lucky Robin reads nothing but reports, Cyborg nothing but manuals, Beast Boy nothing but comics, and Starfire nothing but weird leaflets,

Raven knows that already, but it sends a blush to her cheeks all the same. It's not the superhero in her that focuses on the book and tries to break the spell. Her attempt prompts a burst of white light from the book, zapping her fingers lightly, residual of ancient magic and too strong for her own. She would have thought too strong for the book.

It didn't occur to her then, but as she retires to her bed clutching her book tightly to her heart, she remembers the magic being warm and not hostile. The thought soon gives way to fresh memories of the easiest conversations she's ever had, as though Malchior was an old friend and not one she's just met, like she has been waiting for him too. They talked about the ideal times that only existed in books, the idiocy she dealt with daily, and why couldn't people understand that witches and wizards preferred candles to natural lighting. The low murmurs and the surprised laughter of the evening lull her to sleep.


	3. Chapter 3: Being Partial

Yes, Raven tolerates Robin, and Cyborg, and Starfire, and even Beast Boy though she doesn't know why.

Let's backtrack here.

On days when Raven is forced to be honest with herself, well, she has nightmares about days like that, okay? Her powers go a bit wonky and just! Why can't people get on without making grand declarations?

But, when Malchior said he had been waiting for her, isn't that very much in that tradition, leaving him vulnerable to rejection and her in an awkward place? Maybe it's a technique, but it works and she finds that she doesn't mind terribly.

Dawn breaks – she knows because she is part vampire like that – as Malchior wakes her up with "Hi". It's so intimate she blushes again. She isn't in the habit to blush while in possession of such a pale face that everybody in the room notices if she so much as get a most subtle shade of pink so really, that's becoming inconvenient and disconcerting. Also a little tingly in the stomach, and she goes into territories she doesn't admit exist again.

It's the best start to a day she has ever known.

"It's been a while since I woke up next to someone, and never such a beautiful girl," Malchior says.

"It hasn't been that long for me," she returns, "waking up with a book."

He chuckles, low and lyrical and the something that seizes this time is her chest.

"Tell me," she sits upright quickly lest he could see her expression, "tell me about the printing press."

She swears he clears his nonexistent throat, "My fair maiden, as you know, magic practitioners were the first to utilize automated production…"

"For washing dishes," she giggles. Get a hold of yourself, girl.

"Indeed," he agrees, "but from the dishes to the ink is a story more romantic than domestic…"

After he finishes his story, she is so sick with laughter that she goes into a little rapture about Pacific Rim tattoos. She has experienced this simple rhythm of conversation before, naturally, but only Robin was half enough intelligent to keep up. In the middle of Paris accords, Beast Boy had gotten glazed around the eyes and stopped bothering to hide his yawn, Starfire had reached for the phone to order pizza, and that was all Beast Boy needed to pounce in insisting how tofu topping is not inherently disgusting. Tactics discussions only became heated because he demanded to draft a private squirrel army never mind the logistics nightmare, and Cyborg kept dragging them back to the merits of owning a car second only to the Batmobile.

It's frustrating, but only in two-person conversations does the rhythm go back and forth, and only Malchior acted like his story was for her, like he wanted to hear her just talk. No one's done that for her. (Well, Starfire has, but it was just awkward and well, good intentions can become overbearing, or something. Not that Raven is in the habit to misconstrue.)

It's weird, she winces when reports derail into meaningless personal rambling, but she starts to understand why her teammates had wished to impart too-much-information categories from time to time.

A/N: I'm posting this story in trickle because I am also simultaneously writing another and I wanted to see if writing on the go or actual editing works for me. Apologies to those who find the chapters too short.


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